Monday, November 24, 2003

Anu Malik and Javed Akhtar team up again (read: Refugee, Border) for J P Dutta's LoC: Kargil or LoC. Whatever. I didn't expect anything but the long-winded overstaying unexciting stuff that Malik dished out in Border and Refugee (all the good moments were short-lived; and the latter went on to snag Malik a National Award thus sending his ego to unmentionable limits!). Wasn't wrong. Sadly. siimaa_e.N bulaa_e.N has pretty much the same instrumentation (after all if JPD wants to inflict a trilogy of borderline -- no pun intended -- movies, why should Malik not indulge in the same arrangements) with the same dismal enthusiasm of the mainstream playback singers. On and on it goes. Shreya and Kneegum present pyaar bharaa giit -- another overlong song complete with trite high points and Rafi-esque soundscapes redeemed only by a backing male vocal riff and some strange sitar riffing that brings up the welcome coda. If you haven't already figured out by now, the melodies are strangely similar to Malik's previous efforts for Dutta. mai.n kahii.n bhii rahuu.N will probably be my pick -- to be more precise the catchy opening vocal riff in diip cha.ndii before the male singers wreak havoc. Everyone else except Nigam and Udit (to a lesser degree) seems to summon enough heart and verve required. Kush rahanaa has a nice guitar riff as its spine. Everything else is irritating jingoism waiting for the next song in the list. ek saathii aur bhii thaa has Nigam again. 'Nuff said from my end at least. And then two instrumentals for afficionados to karaoke to (although Before We Forget --- siimaa_e.N with its raag des touches was appealing enough). Someone should study this CD for useful compression techniques employed to retain all the tracks on a single disc! And could we just stop churning out crap like this. Please?

Indiafm has a more enthusiastic review ("[this track] should bring tears to the eyes when seen on screen"). I won't even bother to relish the irony in that line.

At the music release party, Dutta had this to say about Akhtar and Malik: "As far as my music is concerned, Javed Sahab is my right hand, because Javed Sahab always does things right. And Anu Malik is my left hand without which I cannot do because I am a lefty!".

The Malini/Deols pose for a photograph at the music release party. The photograph could serve as a good publicity shot for a horror movie about a cannibalistic mother and daughter who dance and sing to lure their prey ...